Tamya: Shared Soup Recollection - A gesture of goodwill.
Soup, though the most unglamorous of food, is to me the most satisfying, the most fulfilling soul food. When early last year, Tavia gleefully divulged to the media that Steven often shared his homemade soups with her on the set, naturally speculations abound on his hidden agenda, if any; there was none. As Steven fan I knew it was just his way of watching out for his co-workers. In fact, he had been sharing his soups with co-stars since where back to 2002, specifically when filming Pitnol. This came to light in a recent Charmaine Sheh’s interview whereby she was asked to comment on all her male co-stars. baidu On Steven, she recalled a happy collaboration between them and that Steven was attentive of his health and often shared his soups with her and co-workers on the set. Linda and Fala also affirmed their sharing of Steven’s soups. Linda was especially grateful of Steven's herbal soups made especially to soothe her sore throat at the time. Regardless of whether Steven’s soups are of everyday or extraordinary fare, his sharing of them is a showing of kindness that warms the heart and eases the travails of filming a series. I know there must be more people like Steven sharing food and soups with colleagues on the set. I recall during the filming of Better Halves, Joyce Koi’s mother often brought homemade goodies to share with the cast, and Steven would pig out on them, so much so that Maggie Cheung nicknamed him Chu (pig) Chun Wai, because of his ballooning full-moon face from weight gain. I just wish that the press would report more of this heartwarming stories rather than fabricating negative publicity of who's dating whom.
I actually first heard of Steven’s soup sharing with colleagues back in Nov. 2007 when his royal stage mom to his Hamlet, Susan Tse revealed in her blog of her partaking Steven’s delicious soups during their endless and tiring rehearsals. Somehow, when I saw their pix, a feeling of ‘compassion’ akin to pity welled up inside me, the fact that they had to drink their soup out of a flask and not with family members at the dining table. Behind their happy countenances and camaraderie, I visualized the interminable stretch of long hours, of arduous and repetitive rehearsals of the same scenes, and of the tedious rote memorization of lines. The bone weariness and even the creeping ornery that one can get when cooped up in a space day and night, night and day; interminable. Susan wrote when the place was closed for the night, she and Steven would continue their rehearsal at his house late into the night until 2 or 3 am and be back at work the next morning at 8 am. And of course, Steven would be there by 7:45 am. Guess one really has to love performing arts to retain such passion one's work. So what better way to assimilate the shared passion for the arts, the shared friendship, the shared travails and the shared experience than over a shared heartwarming soup. Fond memories are often created from such sharing........of soup.
Steven had been sharing his soups with co-workers since forever. This little tidbit about his generosity to his co-workers only recently came to light in the public because of Tavia's spill to a reporter. Just recently, Charmaine Sheh mentioned to the press that Steven also brought soup to work to share with the cast. Of course, now it is often reported that Steven also brought soups to Linda Chung and Fala Chen during work. In the photos taken during his stage show rehearsal for "Chinese Hamlet" in 2007, Steven was sharing his flask of soup with his 'Mother', Susan Tse.
